Review of Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) by David L — 24 Sep 2008

Picking up right where first movie left off, part two opens with the counselor who survived the rampage of Mrs. Voorhees - only to find herself the very first victim of her grown-up son Jason. Flash forward five years and there are a new batch of counselors setting up camp on Crystal Lake. Jason, looking very creepily in this film like a real person instead of a zombie, dispatches of his victims in a variety of creative methods and at a nice steady pace. Instead of his trademark hockey mask, Jason is wearing a burlap bag tied around his head with a hole cut over one eye. He looks scarier and more realistic in this film.

Amy Steel gives a great performance as "the final girl" in one of the longest and scariest chase scenes of all the Fridays. Part Two has a good combination of edge-of-your-seat suspense and jump-out-of-your-seat shocks. The only part of this film that really cheeses out is when our heroine pretends to be Jason's mother (and Jason believes it), but this is a small price to pay for the excellent scares and surprises that abound in "Friday the 13th Part 2".

Because of all the commotion caused by the release of "Friday the 13th", the ratings board was extra-tough on part 2l and most of the gory scenes were either trimmed or removed all together. Paramount should really release this film with all of the scenes that had to be cut intact, considering how they made a nice profit off of these movies.